Travel With a Click (TWaC) was developed by Rick Stanfield (CHA), president and chief executive officer of SHC and one of the nation�s leading strategic technologists in the travel industry; with support from members of SHC�s Board of Advisors chaired by Jack Vaughn (CHA).  The process, once fully implemented, is expected to generate up to $500 million in sales during its first year and should become a billion dollar operation within three years. 

�There is no doubt a large company would create a major competitive edge with this new process over and above the direct income from TWaC,� Stanfield said.  �By owning TWaC and any patent rights (patent pending), they could use it to full benefit with their own existing customers while attracting new customers daily.  The following from Banner & Witcoff LTD, Intellectual Property Law, states, �The subject matter of the pending application, ELECTRONIC RESERVATION REFERRAL SYSTEM AND METHOD (TWaC), falls within the scope of subject matter for which the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office issues patents.��

Stanfield noted that reservation transaction-based companies and others can incorporate TWaC to work side by side or eventually to replace existing processes. On-line reservation services also would benefit substantially because they already have a process basis in the Internet reservations field.
            
�Our research shows that TWaC�s interactive, e-mail-based process is far superior to Internet-based dot coms as it goes to the customer rather than the customer having to go to it,� Stanfield added.  �Its ease of use will draw more customers, help build trust and boost profitability.� 
            
Stanfield defines TWaC as a sales, marketing and transaction information process that combines existing technologies in a revolutionary way.  The TWaC system joins the dynamic power of relational databases with the convenience of interactive e-mail to provide consumers access to a wide range of goods and services based upon their active or prior purchases.  Since TWaC requires only that the consumer have a working e-mail account or fax machine rather than complete Internet access, the process can be carried out as effectively on the simplest Internet appliances as it can on the most sophisticated personal computers.
            
�While not limited to the travel industry, the TWaC system is ideally suited for this marketplace because it effectively links the transportation, lodging, retail and entertainment sectors,� Stanfield noted.  �TWaC will be especially helpful to travelers because it will always come to them, rather than compelling them to go to it via telephone or the Internet.  Each communication to the consumer is personal, practical and pertinent.  It is not a digital catalog or a dot com through which the consumer must surf.�
            
TWaC is expected to reduce, and in some cases, virtually eliminate the long-standing thorns in the side of the industry such as �no shows,� last-minute cancellations and guest relocations (�walks� or �bumps�).  TWaC will benefit not only travelers, but also the entire global travel industry, resulting in additional billions of dollars in travel industry sales and incalculable downstream revenues and taxes.
            
Stanfield believes TWaC is ideally suited to exploit the �(new) new economy� where information can be as valuable as traditional bricks-and-mortar infrastructure.  It addresses privacy issues by insuring that all emails to the customer are relative and pertinent to a trip they have already initiated.
           
�TWaC will have the ability to use prior guest information from a TWaC partner to actually create destination packages,� Stanfield said.  �In most cases, these are incremental sales via the use of technology to check partners� distressed inventory and initiating daily communication to a select group of their past customers.  This will be accomplished automatically and daily by the tens of thousands worldwide.�
            
A 30-year hospitality veteran, Stanfield founded SHC in 1999.  Before that, he served as senior vice president of the Opryland Lodging Group, helping grow the Opryland Hotel from a little known 600-room hotel in a third-tier city to what was recognized and respected as one of the largest and finest convention hotels in the world.  Stanfield, a Certified Hotel Administrator (CHA), is a member of the Institute of Management Consultants (IMC).  Membership in IMC is a recognized hallmark of competence, knowledge and professionalism. 
            
SHC is a global travel-related consulting firm specializing in creative, successful and profitable solutions to the hospitality and travel industry, its suppliers and customers.  For more information, contact Don Vaughn, senior vice president of sales and marketing, by phone at (615) 826-8022 or by e-mail at [email protected]. Learn more about SHC by visiting the company�s web site at http://www.stanfieldconsultants.com.